


I Don't Know How

by RoseHipTea



Category: Bandom, Panic! at the Disco, The Young Veins
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Marriage Proposal, One Shot, SO MUCH FLUFF, poor anxious Ryan, this is not real life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-02
Updated: 2015-10-02
Packaged: 2018-04-24 10:23:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4915906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoseHipTea/pseuds/RoseHipTea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Ryan just felt shaky, like maybe his bones were attempting to escape. He was so nervous. So, so nervous."</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Don't Know How

**Author's Note:**

> I don't even really ship Ryan/Spencer, but I was heard this song and had to write this. The song used in the story is Neptune, by Sleeping At Last.

The lights were blinding, and Ryan’s throat was dry. To his left, Brendon was singing his heart out, and on Brendon’s other side Jon was playing like he meant it. Ryan just felt shaky, like maybe his bones were attempting to escape. He was so nervous. So, so nervous. 

He hated crowds. He hated feeling like this. He hated his bones and his throat, and the fingers that were stumbling over chords and rhythms, surely they were giving him away. People must see. There was no way they couldn’t. His heart was caving his chest in, his lungs were going to collapse. Soon the audience would be able to see the black hole in his chest. Ryan turned around.

And there was Spencer. And now, everything was okay. Who said breathing was hard. 

Ryan turned back, and Brendon was finishing the song, the last notes spilling from his lips, and he could do this, he was going to do this. Brendon glanced over, caught his eye. Ryan nodded. He could. Spencer was worth it. Spencer was worth more than the world had to offer. 

Ryan’s brain was swirling, shoving half thought through scenes through his imagination; Spencer saying yes, Spencer saying no, Spencer laughing at him. But no. Spencer was worth it because Spencer had spent so much time telling Ryan that he himself was worth it. This was going to happen. 

Ryan glanced down, then at Brendon. He nodded again, this time more firmly. Brendon smiled softly, and turned back to the mic, back to the crowd who had just noticed the pause. 

“Love.” The crowd stirred, murmuring. Someone in the back screamed. Brendon smiled again. “Love is pretty great, right?” The crowd whooped and cheered. “Good.” Brendon continued. “Because we have a song for you tonight. You won’t find it on any set list for this tour, it’s not even ours. It’s not even really for you.” The crowd cheered again, but there was confusion in their cries. Ryan breathed deeply. Brendon kept talking. “Sometimes, our feelings are too much to write them down. It gets twisted up in these heads you know? Creative minds I guess.” More cheering. “So. We borrow the words we need, and that’s what we have for you tonight. And now, ladies, gentlemen, and one gentleman in particular, our very own Ryan Ross has some borrowed words for you.”

The crowd exploded, but Ryan didn’t even look. He glanced at Brendon, moving into position at his keyboard, at Jon, smiling at him, and looking proud. He turned slightly and saw one of the drum techs kicking a slightly baffled and slightly embarrassed Spencer from his seat and sending him to stand side stage near Ryan. 

And now there was a spotlight on him, and he could do this. He heard Brendon count softly. And the first note rang out on the piano, and from Ryan’s mouth at the same time.

“Pitch black, pale blue, it was a stained glass variation of the truth…” As Ryan sang, he saw the realisation dawn on Spencer’s face, could practically feel him reliving the night Ryan had declared himself both the world’s largest fuck up and madly in love with him. Ryan had thought in retrospect, the next morning, that maybe getting down on the floor and singing had been a bit over the top, but who was he to complain when there was a Spencer in his bed. Now though, he liked the symmetry the song brought to their relationship. 

And now Spencer was coming closer, walking out of the shadows to hover on the edge of the spotlight, his eyes brimming with tears as he stared at Ryan.

“I’m only honest when it rains, if I time it right the thunder breaks when I open my mouth. I want to tell you, but I don’t know how” 

Spencer drifts closer, the light catching parts of his hair and face, making him glow. Some of the still-watching audience have worked out what’s going on, or an approximation of it, and Ryan can dimly hear the screams. But the only thing that matters is Spencer.

“I’m only honest when it rains, an open book with a torn out page, and my ink’s run out. I want to love you but I don’t know how.”

Spencer is crying.

“I don’t know how, no I don’t know how. I want to love you but I don’t know how. I don’t know how…” Brendon’s piano fades, and Ryan hands over his guitar to a tech waiting nearby. He turns from the audience, and faces Spencer. Spencer, who has tears down his face, and caught in the edges of his beard, and who is crying and laughing and scrubbing his face with his hands all at the same time. Spencer smiles, and any doubts Ryan had left in his mind vanish as he beckons with a single finger. 

Spencer steps into the spotlight, and everyone in the audience is wild, screaming and crying. Ryan has no doubt that this will be all over the internet tomorrow. None of that matters. Ryan drops to one knee, and looks up.

“Spencer Smith.” He begins, and he doesn’t even care that there are microphones picking up every word he said. “I have loved you since the moment I set eyes on you. I have never known how to tell you. For years I felt lost, and angry with myself, for not knowing how to tell you, or even how to tell myself. And I sincerely apologize for that. I love you more than anything, anyone, I love you so much I can’t even get it out of my head, I had to use someone else’s song. So this is me, telling you how much I love you.” Ryan reached into his pocket, and held up the simple gold band for everyone to see. “Is this enough?”

Spencer nodded, and the crowd went wild, even more, and Brendon was amping them up, and Jon was taking pictures, but none of that mattered. None of it ever mattered. Ryan had Spencer.


End file.
